Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 4251 to 4275 of 4963 results

4251. Cure for an Aching Back

Luke 13:10-17

Sermon

King Duncan

... and kept at arm’s length. To make matters worse the congregation had suffered a recent and ugly split. The previous pastor and half the congregation walked out during a congregational meeting to start a rival church. “The memory of those who remained,” says Fisher, “was the sound of the door slamming behind the dissidents. [Those left behind] were hurt, angry, and nursing old wounds.” Pastor Fisher, young and brimming with confidence figured he’d come in, do his thing, and things would turn ...

4252. Your Home Page

Hebrews 13:1-25

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... brought the gift of faith to this community, and for them to recall how those leaders lived out their lives — how their own faithfulness guided them and all their actions to the final “outcome” (“ekbasis”) of their lives. They stayed the course and remained faithful to the end of their lives on this earth. Dove-tailed to that bit of human constancy, the Hebrews’ author offers the supreme support for human faithfulness: the unchanging nature of divine love and support. In the face of all of life ...

4253. Hebrews 13: 1-8; 15-16

Hebrews 13:1-25

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

4254. Unity and Hope

Romans 14:1--15:13

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... experience he had on Christmas Eve in 1972. His squad was ambushed by the enemy, everyone was killed except him. Following a struggle and with great force he was captured. “I was thinking how much I did not want to spend Christmas, let alone the remaining six months of my tour of duty, in a POW camp,” he explains. They kept traveling through the night. When they finally stopped the Vietnamese lieutenant gave him food to eat. “Merry Christmas” he said in perfect English. His captor told him it would ...

4255. Waiting for Christmas

James 5:7-12

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... we sometimes turn against one another. Our disagreements with our family or church members can escalate into harsh words spoken resulting in strained and broken relationships. There are times when we allow our differences to become mountains instead of remaining molehills. Passionately James writes, “Beloved, do not grumble against one another, so that you may not be judged.” Perhaps the real test of faith is endurance. Can we continue to live out our faith without becoming discouraged and turning ...

4256. Signed, Sealed, and Delivered

Ephesians 1:1-14

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... we receive from a parent or relative, or some property that we quickly convert to cash. However, in Paul’s day an inheritance was typically received as land that was not under any circumstance to be sold or lost. The inheritance would always remain in the family. Having been delivered from slavery to sin and death through the power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, Paul claims that we too are promised an inheritance. We have already obtained our inheritance. We belong to Jesus and nothing can ever ...

4257. Divided We Fall

1 Corinthians 1:10-17

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... the mission and ministry of the church. God created us all to be different. Following Paul the next pastor had different gifts; he might have been a better preacher. There were some in that congregation who in effect began following Apollos while others remained loyal to their former pastor claiming, “I belong to Paul.” Still others said, “I belong to Cephas,” or “I belong to Christ.” We know Cephas as the apostle Peter. It is interesting that Peter is mentioned since there is no evidence that ...

4258. Grow Up!

1 Corinthians 3:1-23

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... .”[2] With everyone working together the church can do amazing things in the name of Jesus Christ. Paul is credited as starting the church at Corinth, but another preacher Apollos came after he left. In that conflicted congregation sides were drawn with some remaining loyal to Paul and others claiming, “I belong to Apollos.” It is dangerous to our spiritual health when we elevate pastors to that level, and it is also bad for the pastor. People become stuck when all they think about is a former ...

4259. Building a Solid Foundation

1 Corinthians 3:1-23

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... roles in the church. “Each builder must choose with care how to build on it,” Paul wrote. The people within the church began making comparisons between Paul and Apollos. Some sided with Apollos, claiming that he was a better preacher, while others remained loyal to Paul. Such nonsense could not continue in the church. Paul simply laid the foundation in Jesus Christ, allowing others to come and build on what he began. Paul knew that divisive attitudes and behavior would harm the church. The way we ...

4260. Praise and Blame

1 Corinthians 4:1-21

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... he has opened his home every Monday night to cook a meal for a group of students. He claims that Monday is his best day of the week. A carpenter shares that while growing up his dad was never around to care for his family. His passion remains years later to offer free handyman assistance to a group of single mothers in the church. A woman went through a gut-wrenching and humiliating divorce. During that time she had nowhere to turn. Today, she leads a divorce recovery ministry in her church.[1] “Vision is ...

4261. Spirit-Direct

Acts 10:23b-48

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... as Peter discovered we might need to change our attitudes before we are able to reach them. But like Peter we must be open to the leading of the Holy Spirit to welcome people into our fellowship who might have different life experiences. The question remains: Is God converting a Gentile into the community of faith or is God converting Peter to seeing new possibilities for mission? Actually the answer is both. There are people we come in to contact with every day who do not have the slightest understanding ...

4262. When God Tests Us

Exodus 32:1-33:6

Sermon

Argile Smith

... on a three-month journey to Mount Sinai. There God called Moses to the top of the mountain for a meeting with him. Soon Moses came down from the mountain with the Ten Commandments. In due time, God called Moses back to the mountain, and there he remained for forty days and nights (Exodus 24:18). Moses had become the central figure of stability for the Israelites. After all, he had been the leader of God’s people even before they were set free from Egyptian bondage. They had grown to lean heavily on him ...

4263. Going Home

Deuteronomy 34:1-12

Sermon

Argile Smith

... generation an opportunity to obey him as courageous followers who would be loyal to him. In the meantime, Moses had the heavy responsibility for keeping the nation focused until the next generation would be ready to take the land. Even though he remained loyal throughout the four decades of his leadership, the Lord disqualified him from going into the land himself. According to Deuteronomy 1:34-39, God decreed that nobody in Moses’ generation would enter the Promised Land because fear of the obstacles to ...

4264. Who's the Real Leader?

Joshua 3:1-4:24

Sermon

Argile Smith

... to occupy the land the Lord had promised them, Joshua finished up his work as their leader. That’s when he called them together for one last meeting. He gathered them so he could drive home an important challenge. He wanted to persuade them to remain faithful to the Lord as they settled into their new environment. Then he declared with unswerving personal loyalty to God by declaring that he would lead his family to serve the Lord exclusively. Again, his devotion to the Lord prompted him to lead the people ...

4265. The Lamb

Revelation 7:9-17

Sermon

Argile Smith

... Jesus, but he couldn’t strike fear in Polycarp. Then he tried to cajole the old, faithful servant of Christ by promising to release him if he would disown Jesus. Polycarp replied by saying that for 86 years Jesus had been faithful to him. In turn, he would remain faithful to the Lord who had saved him. With that testimony, Polycarp sealed his fate. The judge sentenced him to death, and his executioners decided to burn him alive. They piled up the wood for the fire and tied him to a stake in the middle of ...

4266. Choosing

Joshua 24:1-27

Sermon

Argile Smith

... and the time when we registered our choice. Perhaps you have already made your choice, and you smile quietly as you reflect on the value of registering it in worship. Maybe you’ve set your heart on the Lord in a quiet place at a time that will always remain one of the critical turning points of your life. However, you could still be wavering in the sea of indecision, tossed back and forth. The time has come for you to say, “I will serve the Lord.” Lauren made her choice not long ago, and she made it ...

4267. God Cares

Ezekiel 34:1-31

Sermon

Argile Smith

... can be counted on to direct our steps so we will please him with our lives. In pleasing him, we find joy and contentment. Best of all, the Lord doesn’t lead us from a distance. Quite the opposite, God walks with us each step of the way, and he remains intimately involved with us. He challenges us to spend time with him, to listen to him, to trust him, and to obey him. The purpose of these challenges is to help us to follow God faithfully and to grow in him toward spiritual maturity. Let’s return to the ...

4268. Be Shrewd

Luke 16:1-15

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... a thing is said, but rather what is said you should commit to memory.” Or in the words of the great philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, “Great ideas enter into reality with evil associates and with disgusting alliances. But the greatness remains.” Jesus’ strange and startling parable illustrated both for his disciples who were listening and for the eavesdropping religious establishment, that there is a definite distinction between a life lived fixated upon the needs to survive in this world, and a ...

4269. Luke 16:19-31

Luke 16:19-31

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... of food that would have been available to Lazarus. By first century standards, the rich man was doing more for Lazarus than any of the hearers of the story would have done. Yet despite all that the rich man did for Lazarus, the end result remains the same. He’s in hell. Both men die and their fates demonstrate the great reversal of expectations and values that Jesus had been teaching. Lazarus dies and is transported by angelic beings to the “bosom of Abraham” — that is, to a position of heavenly ...

4270. Who Wants to Be Your Brother?

Luke 16:19-31

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

4271. You Never Noticed

Luke 16:19-31

Sermon

King Duncan

... be like him,” Jack Casey once said. He was raised in a tough home. His father was an alcoholic. But something happened to Jack when he was a child that changed his life. Jack needed to have surgery and was terrified. But there was a nurse who remained by his side, holding his hand, reassuring him that everything would be okay. “I’ll be right here, no matter what,” she told him. And she kept her word; she was there and greeted him with a smile the moment he opened his eyes. Years later, Jack became ...

4272. Luke 17:5-10

Luke 17:1-10

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... as for us to use shopping stories. Jesus is speaking to both those who believe his words and to those who belittle his words. Behaving, believing and belonging as disciples is not about earning rewards, or even receiving a “thank you” for remaining faithful. In the first-century hierarchy of social status relationships, to offer a “thank you” to another put one into a state of indebtedness to the one being thanked. In Jesus’ example, if the master would have “thanked” his servant for “doing ...

4273. Broadband Discipleship

Luke 17:1-10

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

4274. A Faith that Does Not Quit

Luke 18:1-8

Sermon

King Duncan

... little more successful, though sometimes the bee would fly erratically this way or that. At last, the bee took off, buzzed over the stream, and was gone. “As the bee disappeared,” Glenn later wrote, “I realized that I was still on my knees, and I remained on my knees for some time.” (8) Friends, that bee demonstrated a faith that you and I can only envy. Some of us quit even before we really get started. When that happens remember that bee. When that happens remember the woman whom Jesus told about ...

4275. He Ascended Into Heaven

Luke 24:44-53

Sermon

David O. Bales

... a hillock east of Jerusalem. Some of those theories are sophisticated applications of E=MC2and others are more humorous: about Jesus blasting off toward the sky by the energy of a star-particle powered jet pack. Yet a lot of ordinary Christians remain stuck in an old science that thought it held the physical world tightly, believing that existence is closed to outside influence, and if it’s not scientifically explainable it’s not real. Not only physical scientists, but plenty of medical workers have ...

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